Caught in the Storm
by Lanerose
Summary: Series of Post 25 Blink and you'll miss it RoyAi Ficlets
1. Pretend You Don't See

Pretend You Don't See

She pretended she didn't notice. Sometimes it was the only way to get through the day – to pretend she didn't see. The bottle he had always kept on hand for emergencies had just started to empty one day. Slowly, bit by bit, it had been drained almost to the point of uselessness. On the next day, a new bottle had appeared and replaced the first one… and she pretended she didn't notice.

It wasn't that she thought he was convinced. After all, he knew her as well as she knew him. He knew everything about her, could read her at a glance, she sometimes thought. There were times, especially during the first days in which the liquid held inside it had disappeared, when she felt almost certain that he would say something – make some sort of excuse to keep her from commenting.

He never did. Somehow, she found that the most worrying part of the whole affair… still, she pretended she didn't notice.

She knew that he was staying late, nowadays. Sometimes she found herself wondering if he went home at all. When she was truthful with herself she doubted it. The spare uniforms he kept in the closet had disappeared one by one, replaced by a collection of dirty ones. One day she had seen him take them all from the room early in the morning, only to return with them clean and pressed that evening… and she pretended she didn't see.

A scowl lined his face all day now, every day. He had always been prone to smirking, she recalled vaguely, but she gritted her teeth and pretended she didn't notice the change. The bags under his eyes had grown steadily heavier. When he suddenly started to look a bit better a few days later, she could have cheered. That night, she pretended she didn't notice that her concealer was missing from her pocketbook.

Late one night, about the time the third bottle approached uselessness just as its predecessors had, when the second set of laundered uniforms had made its appearance in the closet, she found herself wandering back into the office. She pretended the darkness of office didn't mean anything untoward.

She opened the door to his office, pretending not to wince when she discovered he hadn't bothered locking it. For a long moment, she pretended it would be okay if she left the lights off. When at last she turned them on and strode into the room… she found herself trying desperately to pretend that the sight before her didn't break her heart.

He had slumped back in his chair, the now empty bottle lying on the floor some feet away. One hand loosely clasped a glass in which she could still see a small quantity of the liquor that had once filled the bottle. The other clutched desperately to a small picture frame.

"Colonel." She said, her voice sounding strict because of the tight clenching in her throat. Dazedly, the man in question tilted his head forward enough to see her and blinked confusedly at her. She found that if she held to the thought closely enough, she could pretend that he had merely worked himself to exhaustion, that he wasn't too drunk to focus properly on her.

"Let's get you home, sir." She said, gently taking the glass from his hand and setting it on the table. He resisted when she tried to take the picture from him, and she pretended it didn't matter as she helped him to his feet. By keeping a firm grip on his arm from the start she enabled herself to pretend that he didn't need it to keep from falling over as he unsteadily allowed himself to be led to a car. The entire ride home, she pretended the reason she wasn't looking in the rear view mirror had more to do with the late hour then the occupant of the back seat, just as she pretended that she didn't have to virtually pull him upstairs into bed.

"Maes… Riza, Maes is…" He mumbled as she tucked him in, pulling the blanket to his chin.

"It's all right, Roy." She said, brushing strands of his midnight hair away from his dark eyes, pretending she didn't see the tears streaming down his face.

She wondered, later, if he was also only pretending not to notice her own.


	2. In the Rain

In the Rain

"It's beginning to rain." He said, and she nodded, responding affirmatively as was expected of her. His head was down-turned, staring at the monument to a man who had once been the closest to him. His back remained all that she could see – she knew what it was that he intended to keep from her.

For several long moments, she simply stood nearby, a few paces back and to his left, eyes flickering this way and that in case anyone should decide that this open field filled with the remains of good men would make the perfect spot for the end of Roy Mustang.

"Lieutenant." He said after several moments, still refusing to turn towards her.

"Sir?" She replied, politely inquisitive and sharp as ever.

"It is unnecessary for you to remain here." The grated sound of his voice pained her, reminding her of when she had been a child and her teacher had run her nails down the chalkboard to regain the attention of her classmates. The words themselves stung.

Riza paused for a moment, studying the man before her in an effort to determine his resolve. He held himself ramrod straight, except for his head, bent at a precise 45 degree angle. She could almost have convinced herself to go, if it hadn't been for the tight clenching of his fists…

"Lieutenant." He repeated, and she pulled back from her thoughts quickly. "Please… go."

Riza glanced around the graveyard quickly once more. On the perimeters now she could see Havoc, Fury, and Breda returning… she could trust them now to make sure that they remained safe where they were. Slowly, carefully, she had approached him, reaching out to claim his hand in hers. He turned, startled, and she could see the glistening shine on his face. Gently, she brushed the streams away with the back of her hand. Determinedly, she crooked the edges of her mouth into a tiny, encouraging smile.

"Colonel." She said, quietly but firmly. He looked about to interrupt, to tear away from her grasp, but she shook her head and held more tightly to his hand. With a soft, mirthless laugh, she continued, "You're useless in the rain."

It took several attempts for him get his jaw working, even as the sunlight shown on the rivers replacing those she had dispatched moments ago. He glanced slowly from her, to the grave before them, and back to her at once, his eyes meeting hers and resting there at last.

"I guess so." He answered eventually, drawing in a deep breath as he stared into the horizon. His grip tightened at last on her own. Gently, she placed her free hand on top of their clasped hands, trying as best she could to keep the warmth, the spark that was Roy Mustang there inside him.

In all the time he remained there, she never once left his side.


	3. Wondering

Wondering

There was, she would later observe, a sort of bitter irony in it all. She had always wondered what he looked like without the masks that he wore. Had wondered what his face would show if he were being truthful to the world, instead of smirking at it continually as though he owned it when he wasn't busy flattering some higher ranked official.

She'd wondered how he looked when he really loved someone. How he looked when it wasn't just a matter of keeping up a playboy's reputation. When he didn't need to keep his revulsion away just long enough to take what he needed from those with more access to power.

It had fallen before. Never for a more than a second, but it had fallen. When people he cared about were in danger. When their lives were on the line and he had no guarantee they'd survive - even for simpler things when it came to the Elric brothers, who worried him as few ever had. She'd watched his brow crease for a moment, stretching in surprise, before his iron clad control closed his face off.

Pity she'd never gotten him to apply the same determination to paperwork.

Those moments had been what made her wonder. She felt certain that underneath everything he was sensitive, was unsuited to this awful life he'd chosen to live. His reasons were his own and she'd never needed to intrude on them, but she wondered.

The entire train ride back to Central, the mask had been slipping. Then again, with the brothers in some sort of danger, there was really nothing that could have prevented that. Funny that a man as young as he should treat two teenagers as his own children – not that she blamed him. Something about those two drew people in when they weren't looking.

Major Armstrong had been waiting for them, greeting them at the station. The colonel had walked angrily over to him, eyes flashing and ready to lace into him until he confessed everything that had happened. Though she'd never admit it, she'd almost laughed at him then – a towering 5 foot nothing glaring up at the giant. Family traits, it seemed, could be passed in more ways than genetics.

Then the taller man had met his eyes, and the mask fell.

How he knew so immediately what was wrong escaped her even now. She wondered if it had been tears in the man's eyes. They'd certainly been there by the time she reached the pair. The colonel's expression had frozen, and as she rushed towards them she wondered what had happened to shatter his face in a way that made her own heart break from sympathy.

When his composure hadn't returned by the time she'd reached his side, there had only been two possibilities she could think of, and neither bore the thought. She wondered which it was, but only idly – the thought of either crashed upon her as ice water. Her eyes flashed to the man who had greeted them, and without a word being said she ceased her wonderings. Had it been anything else, he would have been the one to greet them.

The mask hadn't stayed down for long. She wondered, at times, if the cost of seeing such honesty in his face could possibly have been worth the price. Mostly, though, she wondered if he'd ever piece himself together again beneath it. In her more brutally honest moments, she couldn't believe he would.

Sometimes wondering was the only thing that let her sleep at night.


	4. Wait

_**WARNING:** This section contains a minor spoiler for later in the series. I'm overestimating for safety, as I haven't got my copy of FMA accessable, but if you haven't seen through 45, you might not want to read. Make your own choices, though. ._

**Wait**

"Colonel." She said, saluting as she stepped onto the front porch of the Rockbell family house. Her superior brushed her formality aside, gesturing to the recently vacated chair across from him. She hesitated a moment longer in the door before seating herself. He tilted his head back, staring at the star-filled sky.

"Lieutenant." He replied.

She walked gingerly around to the other side of the table. Close at hand, she could hear the steady clank of Alphonse's father as he walked with Hohenheim. When she seated herself, the chair had yet to give in to the cold night air, retaining its warmth. She seated herself, and waited.

"Fullmetal still hasn't forgiven his father." He said after a moment, still avoiding her gaze. "No surprise there, I suppose. If his height were equal to the amount of time he can hold a grudge, he'd have to worry about tall jokes instead of short ones."

Above her, the moon hung low in the sky, beautiful and full. She knew, but she didn't look. The crickets chirped quietly in the grass. She heard, but paid them no mind. Instead she watched the man across from her. She watched him, and waited.

"She knows about me." He continued. He leaned forward, lacing his fingers together under his chin and continuing to watch the universe flying by overhead. "Both of them do. They've done all right, in spite of what they lost."

She could hear a funny echo in his voice, and knew the unspoken sentiment. What they'd lost – and what he'd taken. Somewhere inside the house, a door slammed shut. She noted it, but also registered it's distance – a door to a room at the back of the house, not one at the front. Under the table, she switched the way she'd been crossing her ankles, not once tearing her gaze from the man before her. She recrossed her ankles, and waited.

For several long moments, they merely sat upon the porch, two small parts of a much greater whole. A mockingbird's song drifted to them on the night wind. Aside from that, and the steady motion of clouds over head, the entire world stood still.

Still, she waited.

Finally, he tore his gaze from the heavens above, eyes mirthlessly meeting hers. She resisted the urge to flinch at the cracks showing on his unsmirking face. The hold he'd managed to keep over his emotions for the past few weeks was slipping. She wondered if he'd simply convinced himself that it was only a temporary situation. She wondered, and waited.

"They still don't know." He said at length, managing a steady voice, though the effort put into it shone clearly. "They'd already left Central when it happened, and haven't seen anyone who'd think to tell them since. They don't know about him, and I-"

His voice broke, her own heart breaking in sympathy as she waited.

"I can't tell them. I can't tell them he's-" He stopped as she moved at last, reaching out to take his hands in hers.

"I know." She said softly. He nodded, and she let it rest at that. After all, telling them wouldn't change anything.

It, like her, could wait.


End file.
